The ones I listen to... #4

The piano is my main instrument and the most expressive one for me. Still, if anyone asks what instrument has marked 20th-century music, I would most likely answer: synthesizer. This invention has fundamentally changed the ways and possibilities of creating music while moving and erasing many boundaries. As a synth enthusiast since an early age, I’m often annoyed by the ignorance of many laypeople regarding this particular instrument. Even today, people tend to shrug their shoulders indifferently if you tell them you’re playing the synthesizer. Many of those are in a delusion that synthesizers are a form of “fraud”; musical instruments that “play themselves” for the most part. Nothing is farther away from the truth. To be a quality musician and composer who uses synthesizers, you must both be an artist and a scientist.

For a long time reigned a prejudice that music created with synthesizers cannot match the one created with more traditional acoustic and electric instruments, especially regarding the emotional component. That myth was majestically buried by the synthesizer greats, most notably Vangelis and Kitaro. However, other artists also celebrated these instruments in their recognizable and inimitable ways. One of those is certainly Jean-Michel Jarre.

This French artist and innovator is living proof that an apple tends to fall close to a tree. His father was a celebrated film composer Maurice Jarre, perhaps the most known by his scores for epic movies from the 1960s, “Lawrence of Arabia” and “Dr. Zhivago”. Jarre Jr. initially followed his father’s footsteps by getting a formal education, however in the late 1960s he discovered the world of synthesizers and other electronic musical instruments, and the rest is history.

His most important works are albums “Oxygene” and “Equinoxe”, both recorded during the 1970s in an improvised studio situated in a kitchen of a small apartment in Paris. This music has made Jarre known throughout the world and set the foundations for his future works that span to nowadays.

What sets Jarre apart from other representatives of electronic music who emerged in the same period (Tangerine Dream, for one) are his simple and memorable melodies, themes, and rhythms. This, in combination with technology, has made an irresistible combination that brought the synthesizers closer to a wider audience. Unlike Vangelis and Kitaro who both use synthesizers in conjunction with acoustic and electric instruments, Jarre almost exclusively uses synthesizers and their relatives.

Almost every album by Jarre released until today has followed the development of these instruments and also showcased their power and potential. In the early 1980s, Jarre released “Zoolook”. This album was in many ways ahead of its time and has demonstrated the possibilities of using sound samples in music production; the technology that was then still in relative infancy.

As decades went by, Jarre continued to experiment with new technology that emerged over time, even though he tried to remain true to his recognizable sound. From time to time, he explored somewhat different musical genres. In the early 2000s, he released several interesting albums of ambient music. However, in more recent years, the zeitgeist influence sadly prevailed, which resulted in music sounding very similar to countless other producers of modern times. Jarre has always been prone to following tech trends. In several interviews, he even talked with relative enthusiasm about AI in music production, which is highly unusual for one of the old-school pioneers.

To anyone wanting to step into the music world of JMJ, I would recommend a classic compilation “Images: The Best of Jean-Michel Jarre”. Here you will find a broad selection of his works made between 1976. and the 2000. From his later releases, I would emphasize his millennial effort, symbolically called “Metamorphoses”. This deviates from Jarre’s trademark sound to quite a degree but it’s an interesting mixture of electronic and ethno music.

Jarre is a known humanitarian with a deep concern for global issues such as climate change, global warming, deforestation, and lack of water. He devoted many of his concerts all over the world to these ongoing concerns of modern humanity. His live performances are always accompanied by attractive visuals and flashy splendor. Still, his most prized legacy is his works dating from long gone and much nicer times.